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  “Are you feeling all right?”

  “Light-headed. I don’t know why.”

  “Sit down, I’ll get you some water.”

  He sat in front of her desk and looked up at a poster of Mykonos. He focused in on one small white building in the crowded cliff-top village. His carotid throbbed. She came back with a bottle and handed it to him, then sat down. “You might be feeling all that ash still in the air,” she said.

  “Probably.”

  “I’m so sorry to hear about the farm.”

  The water bottle was cold in his hands and his thoughts were swimming. He took a deep breath and let it out in a long fluttering exhale. “Mary, may I take you to dinner at the Cafe des Artistes tonight? The food is wonderful and they have very good wines. I’d like your company. I’ll meet you there or pick you up, whatever’s best for you. It’s very French.”

  She smiled a troubled smile. “That is so sweet of you. But I’m not dating, Ted.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry—”

  “Don’t be, there’s no—”

  “You just never wear a ring and last week you mentioned going out with your sister. So I thought maybe you had some time on your hands.”

  “You are so sweet, Ted. That is so sweet.”

  “I’m really sorry.” He stood.

  “No, I’m really sorry … I just … well, Ted, I’m easily twice your age.”

  “I know. It was stupid. I’m stupid.”

  “I’m flattered.”

  Ted mustered a smile and saw the concern on her face. Her eyes were wet but nervous at the same time. “Maybe you can send me to Greece someday,” he said.

  “I’d love to.”

  “Do you like the Greek restaurant here in town?”

  She was about to speak, then stopped herself. The phone rang. “I should take this.”

  “Bye, Mary,” said Ted with all the good cheer he could pretend. “I’ll see you around.”

  “Stop by anytime!”

  He walked all the way down Main to the GasPro store, where he bought and drank a small, powerful energy drink. He talked briefly with the Iraqi-born manager, Ibrahim. Ibrahim was big and strong and usually good-humored and helpful. But today he looked at Ted with a piercing suspicion. Ted felt as if Ibrahim knew everything about him: his anger and fear, his new gun, his overpowering urge to … do something. Ted dropped his change into a Muscular Dystrophy collection jar. Standing outside, he leafed through a free pamphlet of cars for sale. Ibrahim looked at him through the window. Ted walked back toward his truck way down on Alvarado, keeping to the opposite side of the street from Gulliver’s Travels, pausing at some windows to look in. He saw himself and felt shame. His collapsed and graceless feet hurt again by then. When he passed Village Square there was no sign of Magnus or the protesters or the sheriffs.

  * * *

  Ted took a back way onto the Norris Brothers property. Bouncing along the dirt road he saw Patrick and his father two hillsides over, stooped to some task at ground level. He felt surprisingly secretive about having bought the gun and he certainly didn’t want them to know about it, or see the ammunition. He swung over the rise and down into a swale and parked by the bunkhouse and barn.

  Ted hustled the plastic bag into the barn and looked for a good hiding place. He thought of stashing it inside one of the bags of the pole pickers, which were leaning against one wall. They wouldn’t be used again for three years. Or, with the fire, he thought, maybe never used again, period. He considered the fuel canisters and the many crates of fertilizers, soil amendments, vitamin additives, and pesticides. There were also vehicles and heavy machinery—two tractors, a flatbed Ford with fold-up sides for hay bales or crated fruit. Ted looked at the two dune buggies, the wood chippers, the Bobcat, and various tractor attachments—disks glinting faintly, a mower, a ripper, a front loader. Not here, he thought.

  One shelf was taken up with his brother’s fly-fishing gear. It was all covered by a blue tarp that was cinched down by its grommets, but Ted knew exactly what was there: dozens of rods in their tubes and reels in their pouches and waders and boots and vests and so many fly boxes it seemed that every earthly insect and baitfish must be represented. Ted didn’t feel right about stashing his ammo there.

  The quad runners were parked in the back, along one wall. This section of wall was Peg-Board with moveable hooks for sundry items—extension cords, shop lamps, rolls of Weedwacker line, hats, mechanics’ overalls in several sizes. Ted thought for a moment then hung the bag of ammo eye-high, between the shop lamps and the weed string. Here, he decided, a white plastic bag meant nothing.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Evelyn got to Anders Wealth Management early the next day and checked the S&P 500, up two points after yesterday’s eight-point skid. The domestic tech sector was holding its own. The munis and state bonds looked as good as bonds could look, given that soon-to-be-bankrupt cities and states were, in her opinion, the dirtiest little secrets that financial professionals were trying to keep.

  She saw that the foreign stock markets were all down except Brazil’s. Almost all of Asia was a wreck, looking much like the U.S. markets had looked in ’08. The roller-coaster lines of the Morningstar graphs taunted her from the screen, crazed and unpredictable. The Thomson-Reuters year-to-dates on three of her favorite large cap funds were depressing. Evelyn ate some of her low-fat scone and sipped a nonfat latte from Caffe Primo, knowing that those zigzagging fortunes on the graphs belonged to actual people, some of whom were trusting her to steer their ships between the clashing rocks of the great recession.

  She checked mortgage interest rates and saw that they were still near all-time lows, though few of her clients could get these loans. What was left of the housing market was still constipated. The buyers—institutional investors and the lucky few individuals who had managed to dodge the crash—were paying cash. It was bottom-feeding and there was nothing wrong with that, from an investor’s point of view. But bottom-feeding was such a privileged and sorry substitute for the once-great, wealth-producing home industry that had vanished: the architects, builders, contractors, tradesmen, mortgage originators and lenders, appraisers, inspectors, realtors, and, of course, the secretaries, office managers, clerical and support staff who kept all the wheels turning. Some were friends and acquaintances of Evelyn’s and now they were gone from the business—their numbers no longer in service; their offices now for rent. She knew a full dozen Fallbrook real estate agents who’d folded over the last few years because homeowners couldn’t afford to sell and buyers couldn’t get credit to buy. And she knew there was more to come.

  She drank down the latte and brought up the Norris Brothers file on one of her computers. She’d bumped into Caroline Norris just yesterday and had spent two whole hours very early this morning, unable to sleep, wondering how she could help. There had to be something more than selling off their real estate trusts at a loss on the secondary market, and cashing out Archie’s and Caroline’s retirement funds with taxes due and penalties for Caroline. Wasn’t the whole idea of America geared to keeping this from happening? She just couldn’t get Norris Brothers Growers out of her mind.

  Then the whole thing with Ted. An unhealthy boy turned into an unbalanced young man, thought Evelyn. Somehow damaged. Evelyn wondered what she’d done to incur his disdain. When his behavior toward her became strange—say, five years ago—she’d sensed he had a crush on her. She’d tried to see it as flattering and harmless. Now she was almost afraid of him, though this shamed her.

  She’d been seeing him around Fallbrook since he was born and she was all of fourteen years old. Caroline used to push him around in a shaded blue stroller, shopping and meeting friends for lunch, and to events such as the Christmas Parade, the Independence Day fireworks show, the Classic Car Show. To Evelyn, Ted had looked like any baby—cute. And Caroline was striking. She was never casual but always well dressed and well groomed. Correct posture, expensive dresses that draped beautifully, tasteful jewelry. Even at twenty
years old, she struck Evelyn as stately, more formal and cultured than most of the other Fallbrook women. Archie Norris was quite a bit older, and severe. He’d lost a young wife many years ago and was starting over. All of which made young Evelyn wonder if there was something wild in Caroline, something she needed to restrain. At age fifteen, Evelyn had begun to imitate Caroline’s carriage and mannerisms, and to aspire to Caroline’s presence and—someday, maybe—wardrobe.

  Now, twenty-five years later, well-dressed Mayor Evelyn Anders picked at her scone and remembered that little Teddy was often sick, in and out of the hospital for tests. None had been conclusive, that she could recall. He limped.

  Then he grew up, kind of. She felt bad for his aimlessness—still a live-at-home college student at age twenty-six—and for his faulty feet and pained locomotion. But the cartoon he’d drawn and posted online was mean and insulting and she would not dignify it or him by posting or returning his e-mails of apology. She wasn’t happy that Cal State San Marcos had expelled him and she privately thought that the school had abridged Ted Norris’s First Amendment right to freedom of speech. She had toyed with the idea of talking with the CSUSM chancellor about having Ted reinstated but it seemed ill-advised, given his general state of weirdness. It was easy to imagine herself stepping into something she’d have trouble stepping back out of.

  So, what could she do for the ailing Norris Brothers Growers? She reviewed Archie and Caroline’s investment portfolio. They had diversified, just as she had advised them. But the diversification had failed to fend off 40 percent losses in the crash, which, added to drought, frost, fire, and bad investments, were bringing the Norrises to their knees. She called up their history at AWM and confirmed that Archie and Caroline, as advised by her and Brian, were risk-tolerant investors in ’08. Which, of course, had backfired magnificently.

  She called her old friend Larry Williams over at the Fallbrook Farm Credit Bank and he told her that he couldn’t lend to just anybody this soon after the fire. They’d all have to wait to see how bad the damage really is. Evelyn argued that Archie Norris wasn’t just anybody, but one of the most respected growers in the whole industry. And that Archie would need to replace his ruined trees by late winter—whether it was ten or ten thousand of them—and the time to order them from the nursery is right now. Isn’t that what the Farm Credit Bank was set up to do?

  “Evelyn, can you imagine how many times I’ve had this conversation over the last four days? And with how many growers?”

  “Well, I happen to know some of those same growers myself, Larry, and your Farm Credit Bank is there with bells on for them.”

  “Each situation is different, Evelyn. I can’t talk about specific clients. You know that.”

  “What I don’t know is how to help Norris Brothers,” she said.

  “They should consider selling, and I hear there’s an offer on the table—post-fire—for a million three. Archie and Caroline play things close to the vest, but I’d have to guess that they could sell and live well. But I also know Archie, and my bet is he won’t even listen to that offer.”

  “The ranch is what he is.”

  “Yes.”

  “What’s it worth?”

  “A four bedroom built in the sixties on eighty acres of ag land zoned twenty to one? Barn and some outbuildings? Two million seven, tops. And don’t forget there’s going to be other groves and houses for sale after everything that’s happened. So maybe two million five is closer. Yes.”

  “Hell, Larry. It was appraised at five million dollars six years ago.”

  “So did Ryan Damon’s spread out in Bonsall. He closed on it last week, two days before the fire broke out, for two point seven and it’s no secret he was happy to get it.”

  “God.”

  “I wish I had his number for you.”

  Evelyn thanked him, rang off and brought up a summary of Norris accounts and holdings. She consulted the last few Fallbrook real estate MLS bulletins. She valued the ranch and house at $2.5 million, then added their three investment condos, which were worth a rough total of $650,000 in today’s market. Then she added in their modest retirement money and all investments with Anders Wealth Management. She included a hundred grand for holdings and investments that Archie and Caroline likely kept outside of AWM. The Norrises’ gross worth was $3.3 million.

  However, Archie and Caroline were badly upside down in all three rental units, having paid dearly for them, just before the crash. So even though the condos were bringing in modest rents, they were also unsellable at anything close to a break-even. The condos had been financed at a punishing 6.4 percent interest and no bank would refinance them with that kind of negative equity. Negative equity, thought Evelyn, what pathetic words. So, the Norrises had taken on debt of $1.2 million dollars for three condos now worth $650,000, and secured the expensive subprime loans, of course, with their home and business—Norris Brothers Growers.

  Evelyn looked out her second-floor window and watched the Main Street traffic go by. It was rush hour in Fallbrook now, which meant an orderly line of commuters headed out of town in each direction, and plenty of moms and dads, Brian among them, taking their children to school. Pendleton Marines and employees were stacked up westbound for the base. Main Street would be quiet again by nine o’clock. Back when she was a girl there was maybe one-fifth of this traffic on Main at rush hour, which meant almost none. But she liked the way that her little town had grown to a whopping 30,000 citizens. In her opinion, it was every bit as good a place to live as it had ever been. A real Main Street kind of town. And she knew that without such growth she might not have been able to begin her professional career here. It was a vibrant little city and it had let her stay and become a part of it. She saw one of her campaign posters, wondered if she should have just skipped the picture and used text and colors instead. Not far away was a poster for Walt Rood and she had to admit he had an open and likable face.

  She turned back to her notepad and calculator, backing out the debt on the Norrises’ condos from the value of their home and property, projecting income tax on pension disbursements, coming up with an estimated net worth of $1.3 million. At sixty-six years of age, Archie was drawing social security, but not much. Caroline was only forty-six. They were both healthy so far as Evelyn knew. There were two universal variable life insurance policies in place but they had borrowed against them, gutting the cash-surrender values, and the death benefits were about to lapse.

  If by “living well,” Larry Williams had meant selling at market value, paying off their debts and buying a small home for $300,000—and drawing down the remaining $1 million over, say, the next ten years of Archie’s life, and the next twenty-five of Caroline’s—then yes, they could do it. But if you figured inflation at even 1 percent a year, plus medical costs, and basic necessities, it was a pretty thin lifeline. A million dollars over twenty years was fifty grand a year. Out of that they’d have to pay taxes and utilities, supplemental health insurance, food, clothes, and cars. They might want to go see their sons and grandkids. Maybe take a vacation. Fifty grand a year was not much money to do all of that, after a lifetime of work, she thought. Hard, hard work. Sell it all and live out your days, frugal and limited, looking over your shoulder? Things could be worse, and in fact they were worse for many. No wonder Caroline Norris had looked so intensely worried yesterday, Evelyn thought. No doubt she’d run these same figures herself since the fire. The latest purchase offer from the Newport Beach doctor really was low—ironically, bitterly low—$1,300,000. Just enough for the Norrises to pay their debts, walk away, and begin their third act in life with a few pennies of the many dollars they’d earned.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Patrick stood at attention and looked down at the sprawling tan hills of Camp Pendleton. The October day was warm and the Pacific was a silver prairie in the distance. Around him stood the surviving men of the First Marine Division, Third Battalion, Fifth Regiment. In the grandstands before them were their families and fr
iends, and those of the twenty-five Marines killed during the Three-Five’s most recent Afghanistan deployment. This “Dark Horse” battalion had taken the highest casualties of any Marine battalion in the war. Looking into the grandstand Patrick saw that many of the Gold Star family members—those who had lost sons—were quietly sobbing, dabbing their faces, trying to comfort one another. His parents and brother and Iris Cash sat near the front.

  The battalion commander, a lieutenant colonel, told them that these Marines had done what Marines always do. “They took the fight to the enemy. And they won.” He spoke through a microphone and the hilltop breeze snatched his words from the speakers.

  Patrick clearly remembered arriving in the Sangin District of Helmand Province. It looked like nothing he’d seen before, a strange combination of Arizona desert, Utah badlands, and the moon. Distances were great and deceiving. The stars and planets were wrong. The creatures were a puzzling mix of the familiar and the exotic. The spiders were impossibly huge and the little saw-scaled vipers were mean and poisonous.

  His unit was greeted by desert and the river and acres of corn that would become poppies later in the season. Sangin schools were closed by Taliban order, the marketplace was almost completely unused, and Taliban flags flew everywhere he looked. The villagers were furtive and distrustful, clearly afraid to signal anything like cooperation with the Americans or the Afghan National Army. The roads were already studded with hidden IEDs. Patrick and the Dark Horses arrived to mortar fire whistling down on them, a Taliban welcome. And snipers. The bullets made a snapping sound when they went by his head, and only later did he hear the distant report of the gun. Sometimes he saw smoke up in the rocks and sometimes shooters far, far away, unreal in shimmering heat. The whole place was crawling with the enemy—the Taliban, “hajjis,” “skinnies,” “ragheads,” “woolies”—it didn’t matter what you called them because all they wanted was for you to be dead. The next day Patrick’s platoon got into a firefight not ten minutes into its first patrol.